Posadas

Photo: OZphotography@FreeDitgitalPhotos.net                    

During this season of Advent there are many scriptural references to the blind seeing, the lame walking, and the poor feasting. It’s a beautiful, comforting image, for who among us has not suffered? Even those born of privilege suffer. They may not worry about food, clothing, and shelter as do the very poor, but they suffer in other ways.

When we lived in a wealthier area, people were polite, civil, but mostly cold. They didn’t go out of their way to say, hello, or even acknowledge my existence. I think they knew instinctively by my dress, my mannerism, or by some other secret code, that I wasn’t one of them.

Tending toward being an introvert, I didn’t much care. However, when we moved out further into an area with a bigger mix of economic strata, I experienced a radical change in the people around me. There were more smiles, hellos, and Good Afternoons. People I didn’t know chatted in the aisles, and helped load large items into my car.

One man actually chased my husband and me down in the parking lot of one of the garden centers.